


We Get Struck By Lightning (NOT CLICKBAIT)

by ethandiesofdysentery



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, M/M, Superpowers, i dont know how to tag anything, i guess??, ill fix the tags later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:34:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27648944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ethandiesofdysentery/pseuds/ethandiesofdysentery
Summary: “The internet says thunderstorm tonight,” Ethan replies, as if this is all a completely normal conversation. “How big a piece of metal do you have?”Or: Men are dumb and lightning is magic.
Relationships: Mark Fischbach/Ethan Nestor
Comments: 29
Kudos: 127





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hey gang so my bf (technically the co-owner of this account) and i wrote this together back in april?? which is wild?? and now ua is over and im having crankiplier feelings again so im gonna chunk it into chapters and put up what we have done, which is not even CLOSE to the whole story. maybe we'll write more. but what we wrote in april is already like 3 chapters minimum so yall have that to look forward to !! 
> 
> thanx for reading uwu love yall <3
> 
> -syd

It has come to Mark’s attention that he and Ethan are each other’s enablers. 

See, in a normal friendship, if one half of the pair said something stupid like, oh, I don’t know, “What if we just went out and got struck by lightning?”, the other half would probably say something reasonable like, “We should absolutely not do that. That goes against every safety regulation of every organization I’ve ever heard of. Please shut up and never speak of this again.” Except, when Ethan says those exact words, Mark’s response is, “Okay, when?”

“The internet says thunderstorm tonight,” Ethan replies, as if this is all a completely normal conversation. “How big a piece of metal do you have?” When Mark raises an eyebrow, Ethan elaborates, “To hold straight up. In the thunderstorm. Come on, you’re not the only one who knows science.”

Mark chooses not to argue with that. Instead, he shrugs. “Find a big enough field and that might work.”

Ethan picks up his phone and starts scrolling through something, “hm”-ing as he does, a thoughtful expression on this face.

“Fact-checking that?” Mark asks, watching Ethan’s eyebrows dance dramatically to the tune of whatever he’s reading.

“No. Puppy memes. Fact-checking what?” Ethan mutters, not looking up from the screen. This is about as functional as the two of them usually are.

“Is this safe?” Mark wonders aloud, looking around the room like there’s going to be a neon sign saying _WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU DO THIS, YOU ABSOLUTE IDIOTS, PUT THAT MAKESHIFT LIGHTNING ROD THE FUCK DOWN_ , but when he doesn’t see one, he just shrugs to himself.

“Of course it’s safe,” Ethan says, “they’re not even real puppies, Mark. They’re on the screen.”

Mark nods. “Makes sense.”

And that is how, five hours later, they end up in the dark, in the middle of a wide-open field, with a camera, a mic, and the longest metal pole they could find on such short notice.

“Mark,” Ethan says, beaming, hands on his hips in a cliche pose of pride, “this is the best idea we’ve ever had.”

“I know, right?” Mark replies, as he carefully props the pole upright in the dirt. He aims it straight up towards the sky, and Ethan grabs hold excitedly.

“Yeah, well, at least we can say we did it if we survive!” Ethan laughs. His words hang in the air for a moment, until _somehow_ , at the same time, Mark and Ethan both realize the connotations of that statement (and also this entire scheme) for the first time. Ethan’s smile drops. “Wait. We are gonna survive, right?”

As if summoned by Ethan’s words, raucous thunder rolls above their heads. The world snaps into a frenzy of sound as the black skies open up and rain comes down in torrents. The wind whistles harsh in their ears and buffets the metal pole, and Mark cries out in surprise, the sound lost to the storm. Somehow, the field manages to become even darker as it is swiftly soaked through with rain and cold and danger.

It doesn't take very long for Mark and Ethan to get what they came for. Thunder rattles the field once again directly overtop of them, and it's swiftly followed by a flash behind the clouds. Terror seizes Mark fully, and his wild eyes meet Ethan's. 

“This was a shitty idea!” Mark cries over the din of the storm. Ethan grunts, fighting to stay upright. 

“YOU THINK???” he yells back. 

That ends up being the last thing either of them hears. 

\--

“Are we going to talk about it?” Mark asks again, raising an eyebrow at where Ethan’s sitting, across the room from him. 

Ethan doesn’t look up from fidgeting with his own fingers. “About what?”

He knows what, of course. He’s not an idiot. Even if he had awoken from _the incident_ with no memory of what had happened - which he hadn’t - the tell-tale branching scar on his right arm would have clued him in. (When he woke up in a hospital bed, in shock, it had seemed pretty badass. Now, it just makes him uncomfortable.)

“About the lightning,” Mark says, like he doesn’t know Ethan knows what he’s talking about. “It’s been-”

“Two days,” Ethan cuts him off, “and we can’t just pretend it didn’t happen, and it’s not my fault, and it’s not _your_ fault, blah blah blah, etcetera etcetera. Why does it matter?”

Mark turns back to his computer screen, leaning down over the kitchen counter and propping himself up on his elbows as he clicks through something on the screen, light glinting on the silvery sheen of his own, eerily similar, lightning scar, spanning almost the full length of his left arm. Ethan shudders. Every time he looks at the scars, it makes him feel… _weird_. The real reason he doesn’t want to talk about this right now is that there’s so many things he just...doesn’t understand. Like how every medical professional in their vicinity had felt the need to tell them that they’d been through a miracle. And how they survived it in the first place. And, more than even the two of those combined, how the hell they’d made it to a hospital in the first place. Everyone in the goddamn place was busy telling Ethan how “heroic” he was when he dragged himself and Mark into the waiting room, even after having just had such a “traumatic experience”. But what Ethan hadn’t mentioned to them - or to Mark, for that matter - is that they got struck _nine miles_ from that waiting room, and he has no fucking clue how they got there. 

But he just shoves that away with the miracles and scars, far into the back of his head, and packs it all up with a label that says, _I’ll Deal With That Later_. It’s working great so far. 

It’s working _perfectly fucking great_ until, that is, he hears Mark say, “Huh. Ethan. Ethan? I broke my computer.”

“Again?” Ethan groans, throwing himself dramatically backward onto the couch. “You go through laptops so fucking fast. We need to start a charity fund for it.” He waves his hands in an arch above his face, as if depicting a curved neon sign. “The Organization To Fund Mark Fischbach’s Terrible Laptop Habits. How’s that?”

“No, Ethan, I’m serious.” Mark is starting to sound a little shaky. Ethan frowns. He knows Mark, and so he knows Mark isn’t someone to get overly worked up about something like this.

“Lose some important footage or something?” he asks, not bothering to turn to Mark when he talks. 

“No. I mean, yes, actually but - um. That’s not the problem.” Ethan groans and finally sits up, turning to face Mark. “Then what-” 

Ethan meets Mark’s shell-shocked gaze, then drops his eyes to Mark’s computer, then back up to Mark. “-is,” he finishes weakly. “ _How the fuck did you manage that_?”

Mark is staring, wide-eyed, at his computer, and more specifically at the spots on either side of the screen where the metal and glass has crumpled, as if someone was squeezing apart a playdough model of a laptop. “I grabbed it,” he says weakly. “I was moving the screen.” He looks up to Ethan. “Does this happen? Is it a bad...a bad model or something?” He looks down again. His hands are hovering on either side of the broken screen, as if he’d moved them a few inches away and forgotten where they were supposed to go next. Slowly, he moves them back to where they had been on the computer, and squeezes lightly. Ethan watches as the computer folds in on itself where Mark is touching it. Mark winces and yanks his hands away as if he’s been burned. He looks down at them in shock. “Yeah,” he says, looking back to Ethan and smiling weakly, “I think it’s definitely broken.”

“No kidding,” Ethan mutters, cringing at the way Mark's fingers leave nearly perfect indents in the metal. Mark laughs it off, setting the laptop off to the side gingerly, like he’s holding some kind of toxic waste, and if he damages it any more, it’s going to explode and kill both of them. He shoves his hands in his pockets awkwardly as he rounds the counter, grinning sheepishly at Ethan, like he’s done nothing more than having an embarrassing orange juice spill - not like he just watched his computer crumble under his bare hands.

“I think I'll, uh, go work on the desktop, then,” Mark says. Ethan nods at him, but then pauses. 

“Oh, hold on, I've still got something open on it.” Ethan jogs off to the computer room, saves and closes his work, and then slips right back into his seat on the couch. “There. Closed, go for it.”

Mark just blinks at him, mouth hanging slightly open like he’s just seen a three-legged fish or something. It’s a terrible metaphor (simile?), but that’s about all Ethan has going for him right now.

“What?” Ethan asks, scrunching his face up. 

Mark’s mouth works; no sound comes out.

“Dude, what?” Ethan tries again. Mark swallows dryly, not even blinking. 

“You.” Mark shakes his head. Ethan gestures for him to go on, raising an insistent eyebrow. “You just… _flickered_.” He laughs nervously, shaking his head like a sitcom character laughing at someone else’s quirky antics. “Sorry, my eyes are playing tricks on me. Just...go close the window and don’t even worry about it.”

“Mark, were you _listening_? I already did,” Ethan says. Mark stares a hole through him. 

“But you didn't move.” Ethan studies Mark's expression, looking for any glimmer of a joke. He waits for Mark to break, to laugh and say “gotcha, loser!”, but nothing comes of it. Mark keeps staring at him silently, his whole being transformed into a bundle of nerves as he waits for Ethan's response. 

“Okay, okay, maybe I didn’t do it,” Ethan admits. “Do you ever do that thing where you think you did something, and you didn’t? Like the opposite of walking into a room and forgetting why you walked into it.” He’s rambling, and it’s in avoidance, and he knows that. But it’s the best he’s got.

“Yeah,” Mark says, not meaning it. 

“I’ll go check,” Ethan tells him, trying to sound casual and not like someone whose entire world went to hell in about sixty seconds.

He gets up and makes his way back up to the room, making a point to walk, just to be extra sure he's even doing it. The computer screen is blank; he obviously _had_ closed the screen he was working on. That was odd. Either he’s going crazy, or Mark is. Or, more likely, both of them are. Maybe lightning strikes fry your brain cells. Ethan wouldn’t know. Hell, he’ll admit it. Mark’s the smart one. (Which is probably why it’s so disconcerting that right now, he seems to know nothing.)

He makes a point, now, of turning and calling down, “Definitely closed it, yeah!” Mark doesn’t say anything back. Ethan frowns, and begins to walk back down to check on his friend...before running straight into him at the bottom of the stairs. 

Ethan blinks. He _definitely_ just left the computer a second ago. What is he doing here?

Mark seems to be thinking the same thing, except in a more crazed, desperate way. “Ethan,” he hisses out, like he’s afraid he’s going to be heard. “Where did you _come_ from?”

“Upstairs,” Ethan says blankly, like the shell-shocked idiot he is. “I came from upstairs.”

“Ethan.” Mark shakes his head frantically. Ethan’s honestly starting to get a little scared - Mark’s not one to go into hysterics like this. But then again, everything is fucked up and weird right now, so Ethan isn’t about to say anything about it. “You, like...you _ran_ up there, man, like seventy miles an hour or some shit, what the _hell_?”

Ethan’s brain is starting to slowly connect the puzzle pieces, and internally, he yells at it to _please fucking stop_. “I walked up there,” he informs Mark, sounding about as certain as _not at all_. 

“Ethan,” Mark says his name again, and Ethan is growing more disturbed by the second at the way he's saying it, like he’s pleading, like this isn't a funny joke anymore, when it was never a joke to begin with. “You did not walk. It's fucked up but I am telling you-” Mark takes both of Ethan's shoulders in his hands, and squeezes, “-you did not walk.”

There's something off about Mark's gesture. It would typically be comforting, or grounding. But this fucking _hurts_. Ethan feels bones crunching that _should not ever be crunching_ , and he lets out a squeak of pain. He tries to wriggle free from Mark's grip, but he holds him steadfast, immovable. 

“Okay, okay, Mark, that's enough,” Ethan chuckles nervously, “you can stop that.” Mark’s hold on him tightens imperceptibly, and he squints at him. 

“Stop what?” Mark asks, and Ethan cries out in pain as Mark flexes his thumbs.

“Dude, you're about to break my fucking arms, _let go_!” With a sharp wrench of his body, Ethan manages to free himself from Mark's hands. He feels, more so than hears, horrific crunching come from somewhere, and with a guttural noise, Ethan tries to spin around to face Mark again. 

He ends up on the opposite end of the hall. It was easily fifteen feet from where he'd just been. 

Silence befalls them. Panting, Ethan dares to look down at himself. His arms fall limp at his sides, broken, just like he'd feared. He tries to move them, just a little, maybe to prove to himself that none of this is real. He’d rather be crazy than have just seen - and heard and _felt_ \- his best friend crush his shoulders apart in his bare hands. But his arms don’t move - they just hurt even more sharply than before. What the _fuck_. 

But then, something even stranger, even more disturbing than this entire morning so far happens. Ethan watches in mouth-dropping awe as his arms knit back together, healing themselves rapidly. It's painless, it even feels like a gentle breeze, or someone pouring cool water over his arms, and after less than ten seconds he's completely healed. Quickly, he raises and flexes his arms, testing them out, just to prove to himself that they're fine because they, by all accounts, shouldn’t be. 

“Ethan?” Mark is gaping at him. “Ethan, you just, like… _flashed_ and you were over _there_.”

Ethan stares down the hall at him, confused. “Um. I don’t think that’s the most concerning thing here.” 

“What?” Mark starts walking down the hall towards Ethan, taking _considerably_ longer to go the distance than Ethan’s fraction-of-a-second trip earlier. And that’s a normal pace. The comparison makes Ethan’s heart skip a beat, but like he’d just pointed out to Mark, that’s not what’s bothering him right now. “Ethan, what happened?” 

It occurs to Ethan that Mark didn’t even know what he’d done. Mark takes another step forward, reaching out like he’s going to repeat his earlier gesture, and Ethan flinches so hard he skips back another five feet in absolutely no time at all, slamming his back into the wall as he does. Mark looks down at his hands, and back at Ethan. “ _Ethan_?”

Ethan takes a sharp breath, and says, “Mark, I think you just broke my arms.”

Mark opens and closes his mouth for a second, looking more confused than concerned. “They look fine to me,” he finally manages to say, like he can’t seem to fully comprehend Ethan’s words - to be fair, Ethan doesn’t think he can fully comprehend them either. 

“They…” Ethan looks down at his arms, and lifts them up again, examining them. Except for the telltale scar, they’re perfectly normal. In fact, Ethan is pretty sure there should be a couple more bruises and minor cuts on his arm that just aren’t there anymore. _Weird_. “They fixed themselves.” He looks back up, waiting for Mark to respond. In the back of his mind, he feels the ache from his fifty mile per hour run-in with the wall disappear too, lost to the same gentle sensation, but he’s not paying as much attention this time. Mark still doesn’t say anything. 

“You held me like your _laptop_ , Mark,” Ethan says, trying to see any sign of recognition in Mark’s face, but getting none. “The one you crumpled into pieces like five minutes ago?” he elaborates shakily. 

Mark looks down at his hands. “But…” He looks back up at Ethan. “ _I broke your arms_?” Ethan nods. “And they...they just _healed_?” Ethan nods again. Mark lightly traces the silvery sheen of his scar, and for the first time Ethan begins to realize the obvious. _Shit_.

“Ethan.” Mark looks back up, and he’s shaking almost unnoticeably, but damn it if Ethan doesn’t notice. “I think something is _really wrong_.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bet you thought this couldn't get any weirder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok ch 3 won't be up so quickly mostly because im pretty sure it's the last chapter i can squeeze out of what's already written but you guys were so sweet on the last chapter so i had to put another one up for you uwu
> 
> i just came back to crankiplier after writing for a couple fandoms where 1) no one ever commented (thanks warrior cats fanbase) and 2) no one like,,,,, read them in the first place (apparently im the only one who wants to read or write sawbones fanfic but ok :/) and i forgot how sweet yall are?? :,) thank you for your comments and kudos it means the world to me <3
> 
> anyways, fanfiction!
> 
> -syd

_“I think something is really wrong.”_

No kidding. In a split second, Ethan's mind catches up with everything, and all signs point to one explanation. And it's not a realistic one. And it's certainly not a comforting one. 

“Mark?” Ethan says, keeping his voice carefully measured, “I'm gonna try something, okay? I need you to count to ten.” 

“Okay?” Mark replies, eyeing him warily as he subconsciously tucks his hands close to his chest. Ethan takes a deep breath, bracing himself. Then, he tears off in the opposite direction from Mark. As fast as he can, Ethan runs a lap around the downstairs, being sure to hit every single room. He skids to a stop behind Mark. 

“What number were you at?” Ethan breathes. Mark lets out a startled yelp, whirling around to face Ethan. 

“I was at two!” Mark replies in a panic. “When did you get behind me?” Ethan feels the colour drain from his face. 

“Fuck,” he stumbles out, leaning against the doorframe for support. “I just. I just ran around the whole house, man.” Mark gapes at him. 

“That's not-” Mark stutters, “you can't- oh my god.” Another idea occurs to Ethan, and he holds his forearm out to Mark. “Grab me,” he says. His fuck-it reflex has fully kicked in. 

“But you said I just broke you!” Mark cries out, appalled. Ethan shakes his arm insistently. 

“Yeah, you did. We're experimenting. Grab my arm as gently as you possibly can.” Timidly, Mark reaches out, resting his hand over Ethan's arm. He barely moves his hand, yet Ethan feels a vice grip, and he bites back a hiss. “Now, let go,” Ethan orders. Underneath Mark's hand is a deep indigo bruise, shaped like a perfect handprint. Before their very eyes, it fades to green, then red, before disappearing altogether. Mark makes a startled sound in the back of his throat, rushing to cross his arms and hide his hands away. 

“Okay,” Ethan says simply, as if all of his questions have just been answered when, in fact, none of them have. “So I'm super fast and you're super strong.” He clicks his tongue, feigning for nonchalance to hide his panic. “Nice.” 

Looking like he's about to laugh, cry, faint, or maybe all of them at once, Mark turns and makes his way toward the couch. Ethan tries to follow him at a normal pace, but he ends up standing in front of the couch before Mark has even taken another step. 

Ethan cringes. “Okay, I think I need to work on that.” 

Mark nods silently, finishing his own, regular-paced trip to the couch, and dropping down to sit. 

“I’m gonna figure this out,” Ethan announces, though it’s mostly just for his benefit, because he isn’t even sure Mark is listening. “One sec.” (Ethan is pretty sure it’s a literal “one sec” before he’s sitting down at the kitchen table with his own, still intact computer.) “Research is good, right?” he asks Mark. _It’s what you would normally be doing right now_ , he doesn’t say.

“Yeah,” Mark agrees, distantly. He’s moved from staring at his hands to sitting on top of them, and Ethan does his best to ignore it. “Yeah, I’m not sure what you’d find, but go ahead and try it.”

Ethan hums to himself and nods, opening up his computer and logging in. He opens Google, then sits there blankly. He may know the logical steps Mark would take up to this point, but he’s not necessarily sure how to do those logical steps. What the hell he’s even supposed to look for is a mystery to him.

“Try ‘lightning strikes and extrahuman abilities’,” Mark pipes up from the couch.

“Thanks,” Ethan says, typing that in and stopping himself from making fun of Mark for almost certainly inventing the term “extrahuman” just this second. He pauses after the word “strikes”. “Wait, what?”

Mark looks over at him. He’s returned to crossing his hands over his chest, which is hopefully a good sign. “Search terms,” he says, “you needed search terms.”

“Sure,” Ethan says, scrolling through the results, most of which are either links to forums about Marvel comics or fanfiction about One Direction. He groans, and adds “real stories” to the end of the search. 

“Don’t you dare put ‘real stories’ at the end of that,” Mark interrupts him before he can hit enter - which is impressive, considering how fast Ethan is doing literally everything right now. “That’s not gonna help.”

Ethan rolls his eyes and clears the search bar. “I didn’t,” he lies.

“Yes you did.” 

Ethan frowns, tapping a finger on the edge of the computer, ignoring how impossibly fast the pacing of it is. When Mark doesn’t try to help him again, he starts typing “ _help me and my friend got struck by lightning and now we’re magic_ ”, and as he gets past “ _struck_ ”, Mark says, “That’s not even _close_.” 

“Mark,” Ethan says, “would you please shut up?” He’s just gotten done with deleting the last search before his brain catches up to him again and he looks over at the couch, where Mark has moved to laying on his back and staring at his hands like he’s going to find the secret to life in them. Ethan looks back to the computer, then to Mark, and types “ _lightning_ ”, then hits enter.

“Ethan, you are Grade A stupid sometimes,” Mark says, groaning.

Ethan looks at the screen again, narrowing his eyes, and searches, “ _shut up, smart-ass_ ”.

“That’s not even _related_ -” Mark freezes, sitting bolt upright. “Ethan,” he says, “stop doing that.”

Ethan empties the search bar and types, “ _what, this_?”

“Ethan-”

“ _i’m just typing_ ”

“ _Ethan_ -”

“ _don’t tell me to shut up again_ ”

“I _didn’t_!” Mark says, jumping off the couch and gaping at Ethan. 

“I know,” Ethan says weakly, “but you were going to.”

Mark blanches, as Ethan types “ _you were thinking it_ ”, and waits for the recognition to streak Mark's face. It does, instantly, and Mark takes a step forward, squinting as his brain fights to comprehend the new development. Ethan swears he hears the cogs turning, and before Mark can vocalize his next thought, Ethan is answering out loud with, “I have no idea.” Mark swallows, swaying on his feet as he looks anywhere but at Ethan. 

“Alright, great,” Mark wheezes, collapsing back down onto the couch. “We can read each other's minds now, too. I love it. This is fantastic.” Ethan chews on the inside of his cheek, focusing all his effort on not projecting his thought process to Mark. Unhelpfully, Mark says, “It's not working. Stop.” 

Ethan doubles his efforts in the other direction and tries to think about anything else, checking repeatedly to see if Mark is getting it. _Cucumbers are fruits. In the blast radius of a nuclear explosion, there's a point where all the frozen pizzas in a grocery store are cooked to perfection. There's a point where the people are perfectly cooked, too_. Mark lets out a noise at the last point, followed by a startled laugh.

“What the hell, dude?” Mark says. Ethan grins, reveling in the brief stint of almost-normalcy.

“See, not so bad sharing a mental link with me. You get access to thrilling thoughts such as those.” For effect, Ethan adds, mentally, that the spot where the people are is the flavour zone. Mark snorts, grabbing one of the throw pillows off the couch and tossing it at Ethan. The action is playful, but Mark’s strength was momentarily forgotten and the pillow zips through the air, whizzing past Ethan's head and smacking against one of the four ovens loudly. Mark winces, and Ethan jumps in shock, landing crouched down with his eyes squeezed shut like he’s bracing for a hit. 

“Ethan,” Mark says in a tone far too casual for the situation, “would it surprise you to know that you’ve ended up on the kitchen counter?”

“No,” Ethan responds, groaning. “It would not.” He reluctantly peels open one eye to find that he is, in fact, crouched on the kitchen counter, about a foot away from the sink. 

“So,” Mark says, “In summary: you’re fast. You heal. You can jump. Like, too well. We’re both reading each other’s minds, I guess. And _I’m_ …” He looks down to his hands again. “Dangerously strong.”

“Hey,” Ethan says, climbing down from the counter at what could _almost_ be considered a normal speed. “Maybe you heal and stuff. I don’t know.” He knows he’s getting a look in his eyes when Mark says, “Whatever you’re about to do, don’t you _dare_ -”

Ethan’s far too fast for Mark to even finish that sentence before he’s leapt over the counter, ran straight up to Mark, and slapped him across the face. Mark blinks as Ethan doubles over. “Didn’t hurt,” he says slowly, watching Ethan cringe. “What was that for?” 

Ethan looks at his hand, watching as the unexpected amount of bruises fade away back to normal skin. “I don’t think you _need_ to heal, Mark.”

“What do you - HEY!” Mark gets cut off as Ethan tries to punch him in the gut, but rather than even a sound from Mark, he gets a series of crunches from his own hand. He groans.

“I’d like to stop breaking my bones today, please,” Ethan wheezes out as his mutilated hand mends itself. “What the _fuck_ , dude.”

Mark looks down at his stomach, where Ethan had tried to land at _least_ a hundred-mile-per-hour punch. He’s completely unfazed. He nods to himself, and looks up. “I guess I can do that, too.”

“No _shit_ ,” Ethan hisses, even though his hand is completely repaired. The physical pain is gone, but he’s never going to get the sensation of ramming a light-speed hand into what felt like concrete out of his head anytime soon. He’s taking this surprisingly well, he thinks. But then again, it’s probably the shock. He’s terrified to imagine what’s going to happen when these past few minutes sink in. But, y’know, that’s not a problem yet, so he might as well ignore it until it is. That always works, right?

“We...aren’t going to get any filming done today, are we?” Mark says, interrupting the momentary silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today's End Notes Announcements!
> 
> \- you should still subscribe to clouttail on youtube for low quality warrior cats, mcelroy, and EVENTUALLY mark/ethan/ua/etc. content i promise. 26 people on the internet can't be wrong, guys! (EDIT: i did in fact just put up ua content will u subscribe to me now)  
> \- seriously i wanna host an unus annus multi animator project so if you would be interested in joining that PLEASE tell me it would be so fun !!  
> \- me n my bf "went to" the virtual mbmbam last night and it. it happened. if anyone wants an itemized list of the alcoholic beverages justin consumed during the show, hmu. trust me, It's More Than You Think.
> 
> love yall and thanks for reading!! :D


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Well, if you thought that last part was weird...
> 
> (trigger warning for some mildly gory moments)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my life got significantly more wild today so i decided to deal with it by putting up prolly the last chapter i have prewritten. oopsies!! i have a new roommate in the same way ethan and amy were roommates in player select. you remember player select! so yeah, THIS is happening.
> 
> anyways that's enough of my personal life! here's fanfiction.
> 
> -syd

_“We...aren’t going to get any filming done today, are we?”_

Ethan shakes his head. “Absolutely not.”

Mark looks down at his hands again. He seems to be making a habit out of that - but Ethan is simultaneously making a habit out of ignoring it. Raising his eyes again, he says, “We should…”

“Call it a day?” Ethan finishes. “Yeah, probably.” He catches Mark’s unsettled gaze and says, “I promise I didn’t do it on purpose this time.” Mark nods, but he doesn’t mean it. Ethan shouldn’t know that much, but he does. Lucky him, huh?

“Hey, I’ll give you a ride back home,” Mark offers, gesturing vaguely, and Ethan isn’t sure if he’s supposed to be pointing to his keys, his car, or his coat, but none of them are in that general direction, so he settles on “Mark has no idea what he’s doing”. “No, I don’t,” Mark confirms, and Ethan tries to pretend it isn’t creepy.

“Um,” Ethan says, “I’m pretty sure I can make it home myself.” Mark looks confused for a second, and then he looks down at Ethan’s foot, nervously tapping at a nice and slow twenty miles per hour, and he gets it. 

“Yeah, sure,” he replies. “You can.”

“And, like. I don’t want you to go breaking your fucking Tesla or anything,” Ethan continues. Once again, Mark doesn’t get it at first, but then Ethan beats him to staring at his hands for once, and Mark follows his eyes and nods weakly. Ethan is getting the feeling that might’ve been an inappropriate thing to say. 

“Yeah,” Mark says, “that would be bad.” 

Noticing that Mark’s vocabulary has seemed to limit itself to “short sentences that start with the word ‘yeah’”, Ethan figures it’s about time to dip before this gets any more awkward - especially since the mental feedback loop between the two of them isn’t helping at all. “Stay safe, okay?” he says, smiling at Mark like everything is okay, which it isn’t. 

“Yeah,” Mark echoes, “stay safe.” Ethan isn’t sure if Mark is talking to him or just to himself, but he doesn’t bring it up. Either Mark is considerate enough not to answer that, or somehow that mental link isn’t transmitting it - either of those are fine by Ethan. 

“Okay,” he finally says, and before this can get any worse, he turns and bolts out the front door.

It’s a thirty second run to his house - well, a thirty second run for him - and he has to be careful not to hit his door, which he barely manages, skidding to a halt an inch short of the wood. Thank god for that. He was _not_ excited to add his nose to the list of bones he’s broken today.

Ethan takes a deep breath, and steps inside, somehow at an _almost_ normal pace. But once he shuts his door, he can’t help the fact that he ends up in his bedroom in less than a second. Well, he thinks, at least a tiny bit of control is a good sign. Maybe this will all be fine. Maybe it’ll even go back to normal! Or maybe it’s a dream, or the two of them got drugged, or something like that. Probably one of those, Ethan tells himself, even as he changes into sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt and gets into bed at breakneck speed. (Thankfully, it’s not literally breakneck speed, because Ethan doesn’t want to learn any more about which bones he can heal. He’s good for today.) It’s only seven, but he’s had enough of being awake for today. Sleep, he thinks, is good, and maybe even cures whatever the fuck is happening to him right now. Wouldn’t that be lucky?

Maybe it’s the craziness of the last half hour, or maybe the exhaustion of all his impossible running is catching up to him, but either way, Ethan falls asleep within a minute of laying down, settling in for a night of long, peaceful rest.

\--

It is nowhere near a night of long, peaceful rest.

Ethan sits bolt upright at ass o’ clock in the morning, breathing heavily, not thinking anything except for _something is really, really wrong_. 

It takes a second for him to process everything else. He’s in bed. The clock says 12:54 am - and that’s definitely ass o’ clock, if you ask him - and it’s pitch black outside. He’s broken out in a cold sweat, and something is wrong with Mark.

Wait. 

_One of these things is not like the others_ , Ethan thinks, gasping in deep breaths, unsure why he feels like he’s running out of air. He has no idea how he knows that Mark is in some kind of trouble - okay, that’s a lie, he knows _exactly_ why - but he knows he has to get there, _now_. (He also knows that “there” is Mark’s kitchen, but that’s not that important compared to everything else that’s going on right now.)

Ethan doesn’t even bother putting shoes on before dashing out his front door. The contact with concrete sidewalks at who knows how many miles per hour rubs blisters into his feet, but that doesn’t matter - they’ll heal when he stops, and besides, he’s got more important things to deal with right now - namely, whatever is wrong with Mark.

He stops perfectly on Mark’s doorstep. He seems to be getting better at _stopping_ , which is basically one step away from “not starting”...right?

The breezy sensation rolls over his feet, and the pain fades away. Even then, when he looks down, he’s standing in a pool of his own blood. He cringes, but tries his best to ignore it. He tears his eyes away and looks to the door instead. Trying to be considerate, even though he’s panicking, he knocks a few times - okay, a lot of times, in very quick succession - and waits for a response. There isn't one. _Fucking wonderful._

He slowly - thank fuck, _slowly_ \- pushes open Mark’s door, peeking inside. The first thing he notices is dim light coming from the kitchen. He’d known it was the kitchen, though, so that’s nothing new.

He skips forward to the kitchen entryway, then peeks inside, turning his head to the sound of pained groaning, and finds exactly what he’s looking for.

Mark is doubled over on the ground, wrapping himself over his arms - not his hands this time. He’s sitting about two feet away from an overturned pot, which is spilling freshly-cooked spaghetti onto the otherwise perfectly clean floor. The handles on either side of the pot are bent at strange, impossible angles, and one of them is halfway to being snapped off entirely. It doesn’t take a genius - or, in Ethan’s case, a psychic - to know exactly what happened.

In a split second, Ethan is kneeling on the ground next to Mark, holding what he hopes is a comforting hand to his back. “Are you okay?” he asks, stupidly and unnecessarily.

Mark startles, yelping as he looks up. “ _Where the fuck did you come from_?”

“My house. Just now,” Ethan answers. “Very fast,” he adds after a moment, as if that wasn’t obvious. 

“How did you-”

“Whatever you did,” Ethan interrupts, “it woke me up. I’m not gonna worry about that bit yet. Are you _okay_?” Interestingly, it’s just as stupid the second time he asks it as it was the first time, and the answer is just as obvious.

Still, Mark hisses out, “No”, and Ethan tries to rub gentle circles on his back like they do in the movies, but he’s pretty sure he’s doing it wrong. Before Ethan can try and verify what clearly happened, Mark explains, “I tried to make pasta. I was going to strain it, but…” He grimly looks over to the remains of the dismembered pot. “...I forgot.” He doesn’t need to specify what it was that he forgot.

Ethan nods, giving up on the whole “rubbing circles” thing. The movies are clearly making that shit up. (Or maybe they just weren’t doing it at twenty-five miles per hour, but who’s to say?) “So,” he begins, like the idiot he is, “I guess you don’t heal after all.”

Mark lets out a pained laugh, then immediately cringes. “Yeah,” he wheezes, “no shit.”

Ethan picks up his dumb idiot brain and sets it back on the right mental track. “We should clean that.” He gestures to the spot where Mark is hiding his arms under his chest.

“Probably,” Mark agrees quietly. When he doesn’t make any move to follow through with that, Ethan offers his hand to help him up. Mark reaches out his left arm and grabs on, wincing in pain as he does. 

Ethan’s gaze drops down to Mark’s arm, and he struggles to hold in a choked gasp. It’s burnt and blistered almost beyond recognition, the surrounding skin a mangled, angry red. Even the lightning scar is almost impossible to see underneath all the damage. At one point, the skin is starting to peel, and Ethan thinks he might be able to see bone under it. _Shit._

Mark stands up, shakily, still clutching his other arm to his chest, where Ethan can now see it looks just as bad as the other does. He’s thankful that they’re right by the sink - priority one: clean this shit off _now._

Ethan thinks he might have heard that cold water is actually _bad_ for burns, but right now, he doesn’t really care. He turns the faucet on, running it over the arm he’s holding first, and watching as blisters and damaged skin wash off, reminding himself that this is (probably) a good sign. Mark is still hissing in pain, but if there’s one thing (perhaps the only thing) Ethan remembers about first aid, it’s _dirty wounds bad, clean wounds...slightly better_. This is (hopefully) worth it. 

Ethan is going to ignore the amount of “probably”s Mark’s safety is riding on right now.

He turns the faucet off, surveying the damage. The excess… _everything_ is washed away, revealing damp, damaged skin, but not so many terrible bits. That’s good. (Ethan forces himself not to add “probably” after that one, too.) He examines the arm, and when he turns it a little, eliciting a quiet whimper from Mark, something glimmers in the dim kitchen light. He sucks in a breath, steeling himself for what he’s about to see. It must be the bit of bone he saw earlier. He forces himself to take a closer look.

Correction: it’s the bit of bone he _thought_ he saw earlier. Because this...isn’t bone.

“Mark?” Ethan says, hushed. “I think we’ve got a problem.”

“You mean the fact I burned my skin off?” Mark forces out through clenched teeth. “Because, yeah, I think that might be a _little_ bit of a problem.”

“No, um.” Ethan blinks rapidly, as if it’ll clear his vision and everything will go back to normal. It doesn’t work. “Not that. It’s...well, _look_.”

Mark looks down. His eyes land on what Ethan is staring at, and then immediately snap wide open. “What the _fuck_ ,” he whispers, pain momentarily forgotten.

Some more burned skin had washed off from the spot that had been peeling earlier, revealing more of the “bone” - but that’s definitely not what it is. It’s not white, it’s silver. It’s too shiny, too smooth to be a normal bone. In fact, it’s not a bone at all. It’s glimmering, clean, perfectly smooth-

“Metal,” Ethan breathes out. “ _Fuck_.” 

Mark stares down at his arms in a blend of horror and awe. With almost twisted reverence, he grazes the tips of his fingers over the exposed metal, and Ethan finds himself unable to look away from the movement. The air between them hangs thick and empty, so silent that Ethan can hear the slightly tinny noise the metal makes as Mark’s skin glides across it. 

But then, Mark's breath shudders. Ethan looks up to see a single tear, just as unnaturally silver as Mark's arms, slip slowly down his cheek. It glitters in the low light of the kitchen, and Mark meets Ethan’s gaze. 

“Ethan,” Mark says, in a voice that is much too far away and small for comfort, “what the fuck did we do?” Ethan watches him sadly, trying to choose his words carefully.

“I--”

“What the _fuck_ did we _do_?” Mark repeats, louder and more desperate. He looks up at the ceiling, furiously scrubbing a hand across his face to wipe the tear away. When he draws back and examines his hand, the resulting smear of silver across his palm makes his breath shake. Sucking a harsh breath through his teeth, Mark bows his head, trying desperately to make himself smaller.

“I’m crying metal!” Mark grits out, as if the words burn him, too. “You punched me and it didn't hurt, but burning my arms did and that makes no sense, and-- and there's metal inside of me, and you _ran_ here, and I broke your fucking arms! I broke your _fucking arms_ today! And everything is fucked up, and we got struck by lightning last Tuesday, and this feels like a bad dream and I can't wake up and Ethan,” Mark pauses, as another sob rips free from his throat, “ _Ethan, are we even human anymore_?” Mark shakes his head as more hot, metallic tears roll down his cheeks. Feebly, he murmurs, “I just wanted fucking spaghetti. But I ruined my pot.”

Ethan sits back on his haunches, letting Mark's outburst loop in his mind and settle around them like lead weights. Above all else, his question shakes Ethan to his core; _were they still human_? 

It occurs to Ethan very quickly, as he struggles through the terrifying thoughts that splinter and fragment off of Mark’s feelings projecting onto him, that he has no idea how to handle anything like this. He doesn't know what he's doing at all. The severity of the situation crashes down around Ethan's ears and he carefully rests his hand on Mark's arm, over the metal, to try and ground them. 

Jesus Christ, they have actual superpowers. This is all real, and he can't fix this. 

Even though he wants, so desperately, to fix this. 

“Ethan?” Mark whispers, timidly. Ethan blinks his way out of his reverie, looking up at Mark. Mark is staring down at Ethan's hand on his arm, where perfect, tan skin is healing and spreading from underneath his palm. The metal slowly disappears, and Mark gasps sharply as the searing pain dissipates with it. 

After what feels like a full minute has passed, Ethan stumbles out, “I healed you.” Mark lets out a wet sound, between a scoff and a laugh. 

“Yeah,” Mark says. His face twists into something akin to a grimace as he collects himself and switches his other arm into Ethan's hands. Bitterly, he thinks, _You fix things and I break them, how amazing._

“Stop that,” Ethan admonishes him aloud, soothing his hand over Mark's forearm as if it will speed up the healing process (maybe it's placebo, or maybe it's just calming Mark down, but it seems to be working and either way, Ethan isn’t about to stop). When every trace of the metal just below the surface of Mark's skin is out of sight, out of mind, Ethan switches tactics, launching himself maybe just a little too fast at Mark for a hug. Mark loosely curls his arms around Ethan and buries his face in his neck, but doesn't fully hug back. Ethan tries not to think of that too much, as to avoid sending anything Mark's way. No need for that to come off wrong.

“Can you…” Mark trails off, unsure if what he's saying is okay, but the mental link says it for him. _Pleasepleasepleasestay._

Squeezing tighter, Ethan nods into Mark's shoulder. _Yeah, I'll stay._

After a moment more, Mark raises his head, then with a wry smile he says, “We’re gonna have to clean up that spaghetti.” Caught off guard, Ethan laughs. 

“Yep,” he says. He untangles himself from Mark, and takes less than two seconds to flit around the kitchen. When Ethan comes back to a stop, kneeling in front of Mark again, all of the mess is gone. The spaghetti is in the garbage, the boiling water is gone, and the pot is sat on the stovetop, still mangled but otherwise presentable. “Done,” he says, with a shy smile. 

“Thanks,” Mark laughs, easing himself off the floor. Ethan offers a hand again, and he’s relieved that Mark doesn’t even hesitate before taking hold. Once he’s up, Ethan casually shoves his hand into the pocket of his sweatpants until the bruises heal themselves.

He looks Mark up and down, and what he sees is...discouraging at best. Mark is shaking, opening and closing his hands as he tries not to look at them, and his face is a mask of exhaustion. Ethan lets out a breath he didn’t even know he was holding. 

“How about we go to bed?” he suggests, trying to offer an encouraging smile. It seems to work well enough, because some of the panic fades away from Mark’s face. It’s not much, but it’s a start. “I’ll take the guest room again,” he continues when Mark doesn’t immediately respond.

Mark nods, blinking tiredness out of his eyes. “Yeah. That’s probably smart.”

“And we can talk in the morning, yeah?” Ethan suggests, hoping that the promise of _eventually_ talking will stop Mark from blurting something out right this second, the way his half-open mouth is signalling to Ethan that he’s about to.

“Yeah.” Mark smiles, and it’s forced, but Ethan ignores that. “We’ll talk in the morning.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you guys have been so sweet in the comments on this fic!! as always comments and kudos make my day!!! and as always shameless promo to my youtube channel, clouttail!!! subscribe guys im vibing
> 
> thanks for reading! <3

**Author's Note:**

> hi comments and kudos are great. i love them. and now for your Announcements:
> 
> -you should subscribe to me on youtube at clouttail it's mostly warrior cats content at the moment bc NEW BOOK but i do mcelroy shit too and im planning on doing more ua/mark/ethan/whatever content so. there's that and in RELATED NEWS:  
> -i'm considering hosting a map (multi animator project) on my channel for unus annus and idk how many of yall on ao3 are animators/know animators but if you or anyone u know would consider joining that please tell me,,, i wanna do it,,,
> 
> thank u again for reading we back in the crankiplier sauce i guess


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